Rizzotto talks about Teec
Developer says troubles plaguing golf course/Rv
plan were a two-way street

Jeanne Rizzotto

Copyright © 2008
Gallup Independent
By Kathy Helms
Diné Bureau

LAKE HAVASU, Ariz. — It’s not just the people who worked with Montana developer Jeanne Rizzotto who feel short-changed over the golf/RV resort development in Teec Nos Pos. Rizzotto herself also feels let down, according to e-mails received Sunday, Sept. 14.

Midweek Rizzotto went missing for a day only to turn up, saying she had floated across Lake Havasu in order to get time to think. She checked into Havasu Regional Medical Center Thursday but was later released.

In response to e-mail questions about the Teec development, Rizzotto stated that she was amazed at people in general. “We have all kinds of nut cases sending articles across the Native lands to harm me; but they really didn’t, did they? Only I can do that. But what they did do is harm the Navajo Nation by continuously bringing havoc through me, causing pretty much everything to come to a halt.

“So where did that get them? Nowhere. But what did happen is I started Little League teams of which its own community could have jumped in any time to take over but did not. They would have rather said I failed them. No, they failed themselves. I had a real home to go to. I was just trying to give them a jump start.”

Rizzotto said she “worked two shifts all year, seven days a week. Every time I turn around, I am getting slapped ... but I am continually being told not to do anything back. I don’t believe that anymore. It sure seems to work for everyone else. Boy, though I love roller coasters, this ride has been a bit too long for me.”

She said she didn’t mind getting her butt kicked once in a while, but “wearing a full body cast all year is not good for travel. ... Do you know how much money they have gotten out of me? I have literally gone off the deep end,” she said.

Rizzotto claimed that six workers at Teec overbilled her for a total of 26 days between them. She said that she, Mark Hill, and Peter MacDonald all called them on it. Hill did confirm that some workers had overbilled, but did not say to what extent.

Regarding the remodeling of Frank’s Grocery, Rizzotto stated that she had $63,000 invested “between the roof, electrical, new floors, paint, workers, etc. We were up to six weeks instead of four weeks because the employees Crucie (sic) hired didn’t show the first two weeks.

“And then, right smack dab in the middle of the job, Crucie said that what we had done was fine, but her customers wanted her open and her old shop back. Right then and there, we pulled out. I wasn’t about to go there with her.”
When asked about the workers who claimed their checks bounced, Rizzotto said, “Checks were not written by me whatsoever to any workers at Teec. I did not want to pay them because they cheated on their time so Mark Hill, fireman, paid them out of his own account. Not any of my doing.

“We already got all the signatures we needed. I did stay true to my word. I have yet to take any money from the Navajos whatsoever. All of the work that has been done to date has been out of my pocket. Like I have told many a Navajo, “If you are complaining about the tile not being put down at the chapter house, why don’t you as a community finish it, rather than continue to point fingers?

“Quit complaining about what has been done; rather, take over from what has been done and finish it!! I only stopped when Teec Nos Pos stopped. I only stopped when two men approached me saying they had been hired ... to beat me up and if I died that was OK but not mandatory.

“What I had done to date is more than anyone has ever done for them in their history,” she wrote. “I have come to the conclusion that whether you are white, black, blue or green, there is a crooked one in every bunch. And for the rest of them ... just like the crab story. Did you know that fishermen never have to put a top on a barrel of crabs because the crabs continue to pull each other down so none ever escape?”

“Tomorrow will be a new day ... a day without me. For the most part, all will carry on. You will blink and it will be next year and there will be another Jeanne that tried, but just couldn’t pull it off. When I was high on the hog I had pigs all around me. But when I got thumped on the head, I got slaughtered. And I do mean slaughtered. Even by my own son,” she wrote.